The Caribbean Public Health Agency (CARPHA) was established by the Caribbean Community (CARICOM) by combining five Caribbean Regional Health Institutes (RHIs): The Caribbean Environmental Health Institute (CEHI)
The Caribbean Epidemiology Centre (CAREC); The Caribbean Food and Nutrition Institute (CFNI); The Caribbean Health Research Council (CHRC)
The Caribbean Regional Drug Testing Laboratory (CRDTL).

CR-FELTP Trains New Mentors in Jamaica

The Caribbean Public Health Agency (CARPHA) hosted a four-day workshop in Kingston, Jamaica from February 23-26, to prepare Coordinators and Mentors of the Caribbean Regional Field Epidemiology and Laboratory Training Programme to implement this professional development initiative in Jamaica, Dominica, and Antigua and Barbuda in 2015. The training involved 18 participants from these 3 Caribbean countries, as well as CARPHA CR-FELTP regional coordinating staff who facilitated the session, assisted by Dr. Karen Springer, the Barbados FELTP country coordinator.

The training workshop focused on orienting participants to the structure and goals of the CR-FELTP, which is an 11-country applied public health learning scheme to build the capacity of Caribbean countries to respond to outbreaks, natural disasters, and other priority public health issues. Mentors also received training in how to coach and evaluate their Trainees’ professional competencies, and their required programmatic outputs. FELTP Trainees participate in face-to-face training and undertake several projects under the guidance of an expert Mentor from within the Ministries of Health. The Mentors play a critical role in helping the Trainees to identify and achieve their own learning objectives and successfully complete the FELTP.

CARPHA’s current Cooperative Agreement with the U.S. CDC supports the CR-FELTP in 11 PEPFAR Caribbean Framework Partnership Countries. Six countries (Bahamas, Barbados, Grenada, St Lucia, St Vincent and the Grenadines, and Suriname) successfully launched their FELTP Level I in 2014, and implementation will be facilitated by the CARPHA team in the remaining 5 countries (Antigua and Barbuda, Dominica, Jamaica, St Kitts and Nevis, and Trinidad and Tobago) in 2015.